Vacation: A Time To Re-Calibrate

It’s time to get away! As my mind begins shifting into vacation mode, I start looking for inspiration for the coming year. That is, a good book that can speak to me at this particular stage of life. Voila`, I discovered it: Harold Kushner’s work, Nine Essential Things I’ve Learned About Life.

Chapter Six is entitled, “Religion Is What You Do, Not What You Believe.” Kushner writes, “Every clergyman I know, myself included, has heard these words. . . “I may not be religious in the conventional sense, but I am a very spiritual person.” The implication is that being spiritual, following a religion solely of the heart and mind, is a purer, more authentic way of communing with God than the physical act of attending church, giving charity, or performing good deeds. I never had a satisfactory reply to that claim until my friend and colleague Rabbi David Wolpe of Los Angeles shared his answer with me. He would tell his spiritual congregant, “No, spirituality is what you feel, theology is what you believe, religion is what you do.”

Religion is the catalyst for igniting the soul; the impetus for responding to the challenges of poverty, hunger, homelessness, and suffering. Kushner’s book introduces us to Reverend Lillian Daniel, a Congregational minister, who writes of a disenchanted church abstainer whose school-age youngster wrote a paper about children in a foreign country who lived with hunger and violence on a daily basis. The youngster told his father, “It made me realize that we’re so lucky to be living here and not there.” “The father brags that his son “really gets it. That’s what our religion is, gratitude.” Lillian Daniel responds that “when you witness pain and declare yourself lucky, you have fallen way short of what Jesus would do. . . I think God wants us to witness pain and suffering and, rather than feeling lucky, God wants us to feel angry and want to do something about it.”

It’s all right to discover God in flowers, trees, oceans, lakes, or other awe-inspiring locations but don’t mistake these moments of spiritual ecstasy for religious involvement. They may inspire a good feeling within the individual, but what does it do to make this world a better place for all people. There is a reason one gathers in a synagogue or church with other people. One person alone cannot accomplish the religious task of Tikkun Olam/making this world worthy of God’s creation. Just as it takes “a village to raise a child,” it takes a community effort to address the pain and suffering of fellow humans.

As I set out on a journey of mind re-calibration, I am inspired by the reflections of Harold Kushner who writes, “Belief exists inside a person. As such, it has the power and the tendency to separate a person from his neighbors who believe differently. But authentic religion connects people rather than separates them into the elect and the misguided, the saved and those who walk in darkness. . . The primary function of religion is to bring people together. . . thereby increasing their joy and diluting their sorrows.”